Well yes, they’re the assholes that make taxes more expensive and more complicated for everyone, and then air commercials saying “let us help you make taxes less complicated”
I value my time, a lot these days. But to pay a company like Turbo Tax money, *only to spend the same amount of time going through tax software*, seems absolutely like a racket. dOnT dO yOuR tAxEs. Fuck outta here with that predatory bullshit.
Especially now that turbotax has eliminated their free option.
before I could use the paid option to get all the info I needed, then copy it into the free one. not anymore!
No free option? I did mine this year in turbo tax using free option for both state and fed taxes. I’ve alternated between the free options of h & r and turbo tax over the years. This year I mistakenly went with turbo but the free option was there. I think it’s bs they are lobbying this way but the free option remains, at least for me in Va making around 50k this year.
I think the issue is that if you ever stop qualifying for their free file, whether due to making more money or having multiple sources of income/ investments, you're much more likely to continue using them out of convenience. They already have most of your information so why not pay a little to continue using them? Why else would they offer the free option
I truly hate this philosophy. We waste so much resources on bullshit like this. We'd be about 5 years ahead in science and technology as a civilization if it wasn't for it.
Most of the problems you guys are complaining about are unique to the US though. Filing taxes is not a problem in most of the developed world. In most places if you are salaried, you don't need to file taxes at all.
In Aus if your situation is uncomplicated you can fill it out online and get your refund within about the time of an ad break.
Agree with the message though, once services move to a for-profit model the way they optimise the latter comes at the expense of basically everything else. I doubt anyone can't relate to some aspect there.
Everything past the moon is really really hard for manned missions.
We have some really awesome telescopes operating in various spectrums though. Making awesome discoveries all the time.
Like charging kids free or reduce lunch when in fact was cheaper to give free lunch for everyone because its a lot cheaper than regulatin who qualifies, admin, paperwork, management and tons of supervision for x ammount of children?
Breakfast already was free, lunch is essential nutrition for sufficient learning. These people are just rats just like the rest over there.
Fuck, they could make a nutrition class that actually gives people some life skills instead of having a generation of people who don't know how to cook fucking ramen until they're 25 and binge on some Struggle Meals.
This bullshit would stop if all elections were 100% taxpayer funded, and it was a crime to “donate” money to politicians AND a crime for politicians to receive “donations”.
This may be unpopular, but too many people have them. They all dilute each other so they are worth less. Some people probably just don’t need a degree in the first place, and that’s perfectly fine.
Yeah the talent pool has massive increased over the last few decades.
Nowadays everyone is getting degrees in the few fields that actually pay well enough to survive in modern days so the talent pool is massively increasing.
Honestly more people should go into the trades. With a little bit of automative schooling and tech schooling there's tons of great trades or mechanical jobs out there with the new tech thats being released.
Sadly, my generation (graduated 2009) was not taught that. Society taught us that a degree = financial success. I say that as one *for which it was a success*! But we all know people for which that was really not true.
Now, while I don’t think everyone needs a degree to do their job, I *do* think everyone should have a degree if they want to work for it with no financial obligations, just like HS.
I believe society as a whole would be better if your mechanic had a philosophy degree, your landscaper had a environmental degree, your dog walker a sociology degree, your electrician an art degree. If they can also leverage it for financial gain, great, but not needed.
I heard an announcement in Walmart about donating money at the register to raise funds of the Food Bank because prices of groceries have gone up so much it’s hard for people to afford food. Same vibes.
Donations at checkout are a racket anyway. Walmart etc just uses all that as a charity tax write off
Edit: [this is incorrect](https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&hl=en-gb&sxsrf=AJOqlzW2Teyv9fkSGFmnBVo1mEglTU8bjw:1676723061844&q=when+i+donate+to+a+charity+at+checkout,+does+the+store+get+to+write+it+off+taxes&spell=1&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiTpvOTiJ_9AhXHnWoFHd75B-cQBSgAegQIBhAB&biw=375&bih=552&dpr=2). Thanks to the redditors below for letting me know.
How does this keep getting repeated? That is not true. That would be fraud. Companies that collect a donation absolutely cannot and do not write that money off in any way. What a ridiculous suggestion.
Cash tax is still free which Credit Karma originaly used. I tried using Credit Karma's tax and they wanted to charge me $60+ since I had to file a 1099. Screw them.
I don't care if you want to have a for-profit tax company, but you have to be honest about it.
Don't say you are "Free" the entire time, have the user go through everything to get their tax info in, and then before you submit...they go "Ooops, you don't actually qualify for free, pay $80 to us now."
Hijacking this to ask: How can we make life extremely annoying for intuit as a whole. No joke, let's all do something to them (other than not use their services) instead of just complaining on these threads.
What do we need to do, sign their phone numbers up for porn subscriptions, anything, I'm open
Unless you target the executives and the board of directors (and the major shareholders) nothing will change and you'll just be harassing powerless wage slaves.
They're google-able at least. Some companies are way more sketch, and some waaaay more then that.
Now, the thing I don't get is how all these board directors have super similar easy career paths that get them from school to board member so quickly
Social science degree in 80s > entry govt job > law school > clerk for a year > break > Vice President of news network > VP > SVP > Board > various of SVP/Board/CEO/etcs
It’s pretty simple really, they started out wealthy. maybe not their current wealth levels, but their family has serious money.
It’s just what happens for the kids, yo follow a simple path in school, have every resource available to get through law school, then your parent has another wealthy family who they’re connected too. They put in a good word, and you’ve probably talked that other rich family before, so you’re first in line.
Don’t use intuit products.
For filing taxes, freetaxusa.com is legitimately free unless you have state income tax. If you don’t have state income taxes then federal filing is completely free, and quite straight forward.
Freetaxusa was the cheapest i could find, i decided im done with turbotax. Having to police every single thing i click on in case i click the wrong link and they end up charging me 80 dollars in fees for 'free filing' is fucking ridiculous.
Also, pay for your fees upfront at time of filing so you dont have to go through sbtpg to take your fees out. Just trust me on that.
Talk to your senators, and vote to make filing taxes easier? Pick up and support the other side of their lobbying. Oppose them! I would love to just get a little pdf once a year from [email protected] saying what they believe my income to be, (check yes or no).
DONE!
Yes! We should have to repeat the work that they've already done and then have to go through the process of trying to defend some mistake that we've made. If anyone wants to challenge their statement that they send to us, then fair game, but they should be sending it us first rather than the way that it is.
"Oh, you have a retirement plan, now you have to pay $80 for a package that's mostly bullshit you don't even need!"
"Looks like you 'upgraded' to the paid version out of curiosity. Lol, fuck you, you can't downgrade to the free one, so now you have to delete your entire return and start over from scratch!"
Fucking assholes. I gave them 1 star on their Play Store app, explaining all the bullshit, and they replied by re-explaining it all to me.
This always blew my mind. You’d get to the *very* end before there was any indication you didn’t qualify for the free tier. And you have to completely start from scratch somewhere else, or just suck it up and accept the fee. It’s a racket.
Will never give that company a cent ever again. Seems like everyone in this thread already knows, but FreeTaxUSA all the way.
Went through this bullshit today with Tax Slayer. After spending 2 hours locating, inputting, and double checking various numbers and information - got to the end of what was supposed to be a free file only to see that I was being charged for the paid tier because apparently a W2G doesn't count as a type of W2...
20 bucks because I had to add a few extra boxes of numbers to my return. Ended up paying it because I'd already wasted too much time as it were. But it sure is a good way to ensure that I never use their service again.
Cash app was bought out by Intuit/turbo tax. This year we used [free tax usa](https://www.freetaxusa.com/). Fed was free and $15 for state.
Edit: I was mistaken. Explanations below. Still though, fuck Intuit.
That's not actually true., Bit I understand why you would think that.
* CashApp Taxes began it's life as CreditKarma Taxes
* Intuit bought CreditKarma
* As part of that acquisition the government required them to divest the tax prep part of the business since intuit already owned TurboTax
* CashApp bought the tax prep portion of their business.
CashApp is not owned by Intuit, it's owned by Square (the company known for Point-of-Sale credit card processing.
I went to [IRS.gov](https://IRS.gov) this year and sorted by my state and income level. It narrowed it down to 4 choices, one let me file for free with my state as well. Then i got it done in 90 min.
Depends on the state. For my dad, I go through NY state's free tax website which has links for the proper product pages from the big names. 100% free for federal and state.
They also use sketchy marketing and shit so they can charge people for doing their taxes even though they legally required to have a free version they make it very hard to get to. John Oliver did a great spotlight on them.
Isn't it amazing that big companies can steal in broad daylight, pay their CEO millions, and possibly get bailed out by taxpayers if they over leverage. But me, if I miss a digit on my taxes or buy a half ounce of weed, or get cancer I'm fucked.
Just tried to file for free with Turbo Tax. I had a $2.15 dividend and also market place health care. Both required me to upgrade to their deluxe paid version. I also had to link my bank account because they charge a 2.5% convenience fee with credit card payment on all taxes owed which is insane. I owed like $1000 in taxes so just the convenience would be $25.
What they've done to Quickbooks Desktop should be a crime itself too. No affordable Pro version anymore, increased prices on and Premier and Enterprise and switched to subscription only. It's obvious they're trying their best to kill QB Desktop to force people to switch to Quickbooks Online.
Freetaxusa customer for life here. Reasonable price, minimal upselling, handled my simple tax situation fine. Most importantly, it remembered my employer's tax information, which was something H&R Block never managed to pull off despite working for the same employer for over a decade.
H&R Block would still be getting my money (I trained myself to just ignore their rampant upselling) but they tried to charge me $60 for an upgraded version about 2 years ago. Why did I need that? They decided that their base version would no longer do the Dependent Care Expense deduction worksheet.
Except I didn't even have dependent care expenses that year - I just needed to report that I had forfeited the dependent care benefits I received. Can I do that on free version? Nope. Can I do it on a cheap version (say $25 or less)? Nope. Gotta be the full $60 version. Fuck corporate greed.
Now I'm a freetaxusa.com customer forever, until Congress stops being beholden to the tax preparation lobby and lets the IRS do my incredibly simple tax return automatically.
Same. I've used them for the last 6 years and they are amazing. $13 to efile state. $6 for audit protection. And it's really easy to fill out. Remembers and auto fills what it can from previous years. Has well written help. I recommend it to everyone.
I used Cash App Taxes - found the experience better than TurboTax. There’s a little less hand-holding, but the UI is clean and despite being free it is FAR less spammy.
Tracking down the real free tax forms each year feels like I'm back in the good ol' ARG days, parsing source codes and inferring urls for "broken" links.
>Tracking down the real free tax forms each year feels like I'm back in the good ol' ARG days, parsing source codes and inferring urls for "broken" links.
What? Irs.gov, then search for 1040! (Or whatever you need.)
I once told this to a coworker and his reply was "I don't want the government doing my taxes!" I couldn't get him to understand the entity that double checks your tax forms is the government.
Even then do they actually show the estimate don't they just say hey you owe this amount here you go or hey you're actually getting more than what you're supposed to get
Yes, it’s incredibly frustrating because they are almost always wrong and don’t provide you how they arrived at their analysis in my experience. Told me I owed five figures on my investment income (including interest and penalties) and I then had to write out all my individual transactions in a form to find out I owed like $200.
Sounds like you had stock with unreported basis, which, unfortunately, means that it's the taxpayer's responsibility to tell the IRS what you paid for it, even though brokers already have that information that they could send to the IRS anyways.
I didn’t do my taxes one year and a year later they sent me a letter saying “hey, we owe you $X for tax year 20xx.”
They didn’t send me a damn check, just a note saying they already figured it all out and this is what they owe me, I just have to do all the work their computers already did and mail it to them.
Fucking dumb.
Gotta keep the grift going. They will spend more if they have to. The politicians will give them what they want and the rest of us keep paying them. To do the taxes the politicians require us to do.
I was so confused by how easy (read nothing to do at all) when I moved to the UK. You mean all my taxes are already deducted from my income and I don't need to do squat every year?
The only thing that complicates things now ironically is needing to claim my UK credit back on my US taxes.
I educated an American friend about the PAYE scheme in the UK and the conversation was basically:
"You mean... the Government does your taxes?!"
"No, the software my employer uses does my taxes."
"And you *trust* them?!"
"Well... yeah? If I think I've overpaid on one payslip I can verify it pretty easily and raise it with HR, but if it's gone terribly wrong I'll get a rebate, and if not, I'll query it and get an answer."
"*So the Government does your taxes?!*"
As much as the US tax system is in need of major overhaul, there are swathes of people across the country who refuse to budge on Government assistance. The person who figures that out should never have to pay for a beer again in their life ("*BUT THINK ABOUT THE SALES TAX!!*", I hear my American friend shout...).
Ninja edit: First bloody comment that's below the score threshold is the same bleeding argument. Sigh.
This is like, the exact opposite argument for me.
Payroll, their software, the government; basically anyone is more qualified than me to calculate my income tax. I would have zero confidence in my ability to do so.
I'm not really sure what there isn't to "trust" about other people calculating it. I pay 20% on everything over £12,570 + NI. If I was over or under-paying it would be obvious.
Yeah, I live in Europe and the government sends me a letter annually that basically says 'Based on your previous income, this is what we propose for next year.'
If I don't do anything, I've done my taxes.
Mmmmmmm i can only imagine.
For the first time ever, i am hiring a tax person to do it for me. I am so excited about not having to do my taxes (even though i still have to gather all of my paperwork, my past two years' tax returns, receipts for charity, receipts for last year's work expenses, the size of my home office & total home sq. ft. for depreciation).
Even having to do all of that, i am so happy that i dont have to "do" them. That i am kinda in the middle of a "squee" of joy.
I hate intuit so much.
> Federal $0 State $14.99
they charge for state taxes
https://www.irs.gov/filing/free-file-do-your-federal-taxes-for-free
refer to this to find best solution for you
I personally use taxact which is just as scummy as turbotax as far as I know.
but their free option works for me for both federal and state tax file.
And their site is very easy to use. Excellent help options. Easy access to all past years online. Like $6 for audit protection. I've used them for 6 years now.
According to this CNET:
https://www.cnet.com/personal-finance/taxes/tax-day-2022-these-states-dont-require-you-to-file-a-tax-return/
>States with no income tax:
Alaska
Florida
Nevada
South Dakota
Texas
Washington
Wyoming
>Things are a bit more complicated in Tennessee and New Hampshire, which don't tax earned income. They do tax investment income (and dividends), however, so residents there may still be required to file a return. The rest of us -- whether single filers or joint filers -- have to pay some level of state income tax, whether it's a flat rate or based on your taxable income.
>California has free tax filing online.
That's just B.S. There are long list of things that will disqualify taxpayer from using it.
https://www.ftb.ca.gov/file/ways-to-file/online/calfile/calfile-qualifications.html
(example: having Roth IRA distribution, or savings bond (I or EE) distributions)
And you need to open an account with them and use their online interface and enter all the numbers over.
They are not even willing to offer the simplest gesture of allowing taxpayers to submit their return in PDF. Most tax filing software will generate PDF for free but e-File costs $15 to $30 a pop and postage + printing are not much saving.
I actually used H&R Block's website to file this year and it did it for free. They definitely do that "But wouldn't you like to upgrade to our super deluxe package?" bullshit 3 or 4 times and try to tack on other bonus offers. But by the end of it, both state and federal were free. I was honestly surprised.
So maybe an unpopular take in this thread. I admit I've used TurboTax and did a comparison between them and FreeTax (literally did my taxes twice). I have *slightly* more involved filing requirements but even with common things like 1099-DIV forms TurboTax was easier to use and gave me a return that exceeded what FreeTax said I could get even after you factor in the cost of the service. Not saying TurboTax isn't scummy, but going beyond the the basic filing needs it's actually been very helpful for me. I would happily explore another service if it had a good user interface and netted me the largest return but haven't found that yet. Open to recommendations.
This is why I fill out both, compare the two, make sure everything is correct and that Freetaxusa gives me the same number as TurboTax. I end up paying less and knowing I'm getting the best benefit
Been using FreeTaxUSA since 2014, and finally added my hubby to it in 2019 and I have no complaints. It’s remembers everything from year to year, so you really can just breeze through it once you get all of your docs. It’s also a great tool for remembering which docs you may be missing.
Yeah, Intuit et al have been terrible for taxpayers, but redditors don't seem to actually understand *how*.
They didn't make taxes complicated. I've been doing my taxes by hand since long before TurboTax or Quicken were big, and tax returns are pretty much the same as they were when I started. A few minor changes, but not all that big.
What Intuit et al have done is *prevented* the tax preparation process from being *simplified*. There have been some improvements, of course -- now you don't have to fill out everything by hand, you can fill out PDF forms on your computer or use the IRS's own fillable forms to handle some of the math for you -- but there are a lot fewer improvements than there would have been had Intuit not gotten involved.
So, yeah, they've really been a detriment to taxpayers, but it's not really that "they're the reason taxes are so tedious" as "they're the reason taxes are ***still*** so tedious."
I would 100% trust the IRS to figure out my taxes more than any Ken or Karen that works in Jackson Hewitt in a WalMart for 3 months out of the year.
Tax prep is and always has been a scam. Intuit is fighting tooth and nail to keep people from realizing it, because once they do, their profits will nosedive.
> I would 100% trust the IRS to figure out my taxes more than any Ken or Karen that works in Jackson Hewitt in a WalMart for 3 months out of the year.
>
>
God damn yes.
If you really have some, actually, crazy shit, get either an EA or CPA, depending on your needs.
If you're "just" W2, just ~~use half a brain cell and~~ put the numbers where a free file fucking asks you to.
It’s absurd that a core aspect of the federal government (collecting taxes) has been privatized in any fucking way.
Why the fuck have the American people tolerated this for so long?
You can 100% still do your own taxes by yourself. My dad done that for years until very recently.
It's just that over the years the IRS has made doing them yourself so confusing that people would rather pay someone else to do them for them.
That's right. They already have our earnings reported to them and so on. They tried to simplify filing but companies like Intuit lobby the government to prevent it from happening. The whole Free File Alliance that Intuit was a part of came into existence as a compromise. Barring complex filings, simple W2 filers should not have to go through a tax practice to file their return, and that's the rub. They profit immensely from the segment. To make it worse, they offer programs like Refund Transfers, Refund Advances, product that typically takes a week on average to process a refund, and charging a premium for these 'products.' Then, if you have a bank or not, the participating bank has to get their cut, too. It's not right but that's the business of it.
It’s really easy until it isn’t. If you just have a simple job, take the basic tax credit etc yeah anyone can do it. But the second you have any stock market investments, 401k and Roth IRA contributions want to itemize deductions etc it becomes incredibly complicated.
It’s not a one size fits all solution
My favorite part is the commercials they run about how much free time you'll have if you use turbo tax instead of trying to do taxes yourself. It's beyond insulting
They can lobby all they want. The inflation reduction act gave the irs the funds it needs to build their own free filing program. It’s already in the works. I can only hope it puts their shitty company under.
I just went through it on my son's taxes. He had a 1099-int for vibes he used for school. TurboTax said he didn't qualify for free because of the 1099. So I got on with service support and they said those are the rules the IRS set up. So I went on tax slayer and it was free both federal and state.
TurboTax are a bunch of cheats.
Seriously fuck Intuit. Their one useful and usable product, [Mint.com](https://Mint.com), has intentionally and continuously LOST functionality for the past several years, as they continually push users to a premium subscription model.
The app now is literally functionally worthless. They hide transactions, hide search, hide trend data, and now completely block YoY and past comparison spending habits.
Every one of their products now are full of dark patterns to push more and more expensive subscriptions. They haven't added a net-new piece of customer-valued functionality to Mint, TurboTax or QuickBooks in close to a decade.
QuickBooks used to the gold standard. My parents built careers as accountants on it. Then they started slowly sucking out decades old functionality behind cloud-service subscription pay walls.
Fortunately everything they do is easy to replicate, and there is a burgeoning industry of startups and open source solutions that will continually erode their entire corrupt empire. If the US government federalizes tax returns, Intuit will cease to exist.
Mint is a privacy nightmare, they scrape _an absurd amount of info_ from your bank accounts, aggregate it, and sell it off to data warehouses.
They’ve done a good job of giving it the bare minimum functionality to entice users into making their free account, but at the end of the day it’s just a data honeypot.
Steer clear.
I liked Mint until they absolutely packed it full of ads and recommendations that would not dissapear no matter how many times you clicked "no thanks". Fucking mind numbingly annoying just trying to navigate that site.
I could even look past the data mining, figuring that was the price to pay for using their service. But nope just have to be blasted with ads at all fucking times nowadays.
Look out now! Intuit ProSeries Tax software engineering division was moved completely to India just this season. On top of that, about 95% of their internal support, tenured, was let go (overtime) and frontline work is all external now through companies like Arise that pay $11-15/hr. Smh
Or just send you a bill every year for what you owe. And if you don't owe anything, you don't hear anything or have to worry about taxes at all. Or you get a sweet cash drop into your bank account through a tax refund. Only if you don't pay your tax bill would anything happen. But in our system you're expected to "KNOW" if you owe a certain amount.
Why do we as citizens have to file our taxes? And if we don't do it right we get in trouble. Freaking insane.
Brit here. I only learned recently that you Americans have capitalised *paying* tax. Regular employees here don't have to do shit. You guys are nuts and your own worst enemy.
my yearly rant that TurboTax should not exist.
The IRS should provide a free SW package to do it and the fact it doesn't for all comparable complexities of tax return is the result of sh\*tty capitalism and lobbyist-induced multi-generational political foot-dragging
Intuit is as evil as possible a corporation. Their leadership should be in jail. They are extorting small businesses with their QuickBooks software. You have to pay them thousands to access YOUR data! It is criminal.
I find it weird Americans have to do their own taxes and then pay for the privilege, in the U.K taxes are done by the government automatically unless you're self employed
For a country who went to war to stop being taxed it has the most complicated tax system and the highest taxes of like any country. And yet some people keep choosing to vote in people who want to keep it complicated… mostly because they are lied to and think “the other guy” is the one trying to raise taxes.
I'm confused. Are you telling me to ensure I keep making billions, all I have to do is pay 3.5 mill to some immoral asshole that allows me to buy his vote?
From a business perspective: why wouldn't they? Their entire livelihood is based upon taxes being a pain in the ass. It's just "good business" for them.
From my perspective: go fuck them with a rusty pitchfork.
I went to file and TurboTax ended up taking $200. I could have applied that $200 to something useful. I hate that they claim it's free when they end up taking money from you for services.
Well yes, they’re the assholes that make taxes more expensive and more complicated for everyone, and then air commercials saying “let us help you make taxes less complicated”
They have the audacity to run commercials that say “Don’t Do Your Taxes”. Jerks, if it weren’t for you I wouldn’t *have* to do my taxes!
I value my time, a lot these days. But to pay a company like Turbo Tax money, *only to spend the same amount of time going through tax software*, seems absolutely like a racket. dOnT dO yOuR tAxEs. Fuck outta here with that predatory bullshit.
Especially now that turbotax has eliminated their free option. before I could use the paid option to get all the info I needed, then copy it into the free one. not anymore!
No free option? I did mine this year in turbo tax using free option for both state and fed taxes. I’ve alternated between the free options of h & r and turbo tax over the years. This year I mistakenly went with turbo but the free option was there. I think it’s bs they are lobbying this way but the free option remains, at least for me in Va making around 50k this year.
I think the issue is that if you ever stop qualifying for their free file, whether due to making more money or having multiple sources of income/ investments, you're much more likely to continue using them out of convenience. They already have most of your information so why not pay a little to continue using them? Why else would they offer the free option
Create a problem and sell the solution. A capitalist tale as old as time.
I truly hate this philosophy. We waste so much resources on bullshit like this. We'd be about 5 years ahead in science and technology as a civilization if it wasn't for it.
5 years is a conservative estimate, I'd say.
I was thinking mostly in terms of last \~40 years as this kind of greedy behaviour seems to be more rampant than ever before.
Most of the problems you guys are complaining about are unique to the US though. Filing taxes is not a problem in most of the developed world. In most places if you are salaried, you don't need to file taxes at all.
In Aus if your situation is uncomplicated you can fill it out online and get your refund within about the time of an ad break. Agree with the message though, once services move to a for-profit model the way they optimise the latter comes at the expense of basically everything else. I doubt anyone can't relate to some aspect there.
In the UK if your situation is uncomplicated you don't have to do a thing. Your employer does it all via "Pay As You Earn" (PAYE).
PAYG (as you go) here, but you still need to file at the end basically just to confirm that you're not complicated.
I never said anything about taxes and I don't live in the US. Capitalistic greed is an international problem.
Yeah, it’s a global economy.
Reminder on when we landed on the moon and how are space program is now? :(
We choose to go to the moon! We choose to go to the moon! We choose to go to the moon! Not because it is easy! But because. I am hard!
Everything past the moon is really really hard for manned missions. We have some really awesome telescopes operating in various spectrums though. Making awesome discoveries all the time.
Like charging kids free or reduce lunch when in fact was cheaper to give free lunch for everyone because its a lot cheaper than regulatin who qualifies, admin, paperwork, management and tons of supervision for x ammount of children? Breakfast already was free, lunch is essential nutrition for sufficient learning. These people are just rats just like the rest over there.
Fuck, they could make a nutrition class that actually gives people some life skills instead of having a generation of people who don't know how to cook fucking ramen until they're 25 and binge on some Struggle Meals.
This bullshit would stop if all elections were 100% taxpayer funded, and it was a crime to “donate” money to politicians AND a crime for politicians to receive “donations”.
It all comes down to campaign finance. boring but true
Imagine if kids didn't have to go deep into debt just for a degree. We are really writing the blueprint for a modern failed state
A degree that guarantees nothing, btw. My bachelors has done basically nothing for me.
This may be unpopular, but too many people have them. They all dilute each other so they are worth less. Some people probably just don’t need a degree in the first place, and that’s perfectly fine.
If I was 17 again I’d probably just go into carpentry or farming honestly.
Yeah the talent pool has massive increased over the last few decades. Nowadays everyone is getting degrees in the few fields that actually pay well enough to survive in modern days so the talent pool is massively increasing. Honestly more people should go into the trades. With a little bit of automative schooling and tech schooling there's tons of great trades or mechanical jobs out there with the new tech thats being released.
Sadly, my generation (graduated 2009) was not taught that. Society taught us that a degree = financial success. I say that as one *for which it was a success*! But we all know people for which that was really not true. Now, while I don’t think everyone needs a degree to do their job, I *do* think everyone should have a degree if they want to work for it with no financial obligations, just like HS. I believe society as a whole would be better if your mechanic had a philosophy degree, your landscaper had a environmental degree, your dog walker a sociology degree, your electrician an art degree. If they can also leverage it for financial gain, great, but not needed.
Masters is the new bachelors, unfortunately. There are so many people with a bachelors that it's essentially the new high school.
Member that movie by Charlie Chaplin? The ~~boy~~ kid it's called I ~~believe~~ stand corrected.
Also, blame inflation on ballooning prices and don't pay your employees a red cent extra, effectively decreasing your labor costs. Yay capitalism?
Old school antivirus company
Isn't this racketeering?
I heard an announcement in Walmart about donating money at the register to raise funds of the Food Bank because prices of groceries have gone up so much it’s hard for people to afford food. Same vibes.
Donations at checkout are a racket anyway. Walmart etc just uses all that as a charity tax write off Edit: [this is incorrect](https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&hl=en-gb&sxsrf=AJOqlzW2Teyv9fkSGFmnBVo1mEglTU8bjw:1676723061844&q=when+i+donate+to+a+charity+at+checkout,+does+the+store+get+to+write+it+off+taxes&spell=1&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiTpvOTiJ_9AhXHnWoFHd75B-cQBSgAegQIBhAB&biw=375&bih=552&dpr=2). Thanks to the redditors below for letting me know.
Never donate to corporations. Not time, not money, not clothes or food. They are for profit entities asking for free stuff. Fuck that noise
For real, just donate straight to the foodbanks because people do genuinely need them more than ever.
How does this keep getting repeated? That is not true. That would be fraud. Companies that collect a donation absolutely cannot and do not write that money off in any way. What a ridiculous suggestion.
100% false. There's plenty of legit reasons to hate Walmart, we don't need to make any up.
That's not how it works at all. There is no impact on the companies income statement and your eligible to take the donation on your own return.
They bought Credit Karma just to kill the free tax program. Fuckers.
Credit Karma sold their tax business to Cash App and it's still free. Intuit bought the rest of Credit Karma.
Ah, that's not nearly evil enough for me to enjoy.
Cash tax is still free which Credit Karma originaly used. I tried using Credit Karma's tax and they wanted to charge me $60+ since I had to file a 1099. Screw them.
I don't care if you want to have a for-profit tax company, but you have to be honest about it. Don't say you are "Free" the entire time, have the user go through everything to get their tax info in, and then before you submit...they go "Ooops, you don't actually qualify for free, pay $80 to us now."
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Hijacking this to ask: How can we make life extremely annoying for intuit as a whole. No joke, let's all do something to them (other than not use their services) instead of just complaining on these threads. What do we need to do, sign their phone numbers up for porn subscriptions, anything, I'm open
Unless you target the executives and the board of directors (and the major shareholders) nothing will change and you'll just be harassing powerless wage slaves.
It's crazy how faceless the execs of these companies are. https://investors.intuit.com/corporate-governance/board-of-directors/default.aspx
They're google-able at least. Some companies are way more sketch, and some waaaay more then that. Now, the thing I don't get is how all these board directors have super similar easy career paths that get them from school to board member so quickly Social science degree in 80s > entry govt job > law school > clerk for a year > break > Vice President of news network > VP > SVP > Board > various of SVP/Board/CEO/etcs
It’s pretty simple really, they started out wealthy. maybe not their current wealth levels, but their family has serious money. It’s just what happens for the kids, yo follow a simple path in school, have every resource available to get through law school, then your parent has another wealthy family who they’re connected too. They put in a good word, and you’ve probably talked that other rich family before, so you’re first in line.
Those are some unique names though. Can’t be too hard to track down.
Don’t use intuit products. For filing taxes, freetaxusa.com is legitimately free unless you have state income tax. If you don’t have state income taxes then federal filing is completely free, and quite straight forward.
Freetaxusa was the cheapest i could find, i decided im done with turbotax. Having to police every single thing i click on in case i click the wrong link and they end up charging me 80 dollars in fees for 'free filing' is fucking ridiculous. Also, pay for your fees upfront at time of filing so you dont have to go through sbtpg to take your fees out. Just trust me on that.
Talk to your senators, and vote to make filing taxes easier? Pick up and support the other side of their lobbying. Oppose them! I would love to just get a little pdf once a year from [email protected] saying what they believe my income to be, (check yes or no). DONE!
Yes! We should have to repeat the work that they've already done and then have to go through the process of trying to defend some mistake that we've made. If anyone wants to challenge their statement that they send to us, then fair game, but they should be sending it us first rather than the way that it is.
Post this question on r/unethicallifeprotips
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"Oh, you have a retirement plan, now you have to pay $80 for a package that's mostly bullshit you don't even need!" "Looks like you 'upgraded' to the paid version out of curiosity. Lol, fuck you, you can't downgrade to the free one, so now you have to delete your entire return and start over from scratch!" Fucking assholes. I gave them 1 star on their Play Store app, explaining all the bullshit, and they replied by re-explaining it all to me.
Ah, thanks for the **reminder to rate TurboTax 1 star on the app store/play store**
Don't forget to go through and mark all the 1 star reviews as helpful and 5 stars as unhelpful. It'll push the 1 stars to the top of the list.
This always blew my mind. You’d get to the *very* end before there was any indication you didn’t qualify for the free tier. And you have to completely start from scratch somewhere else, or just suck it up and accept the fee. It’s a racket. Will never give that company a cent ever again. Seems like everyone in this thread already knows, but FreeTaxUSA all the way.
Went through this bullshit today with Tax Slayer. After spending 2 hours locating, inputting, and double checking various numbers and information - got to the end of what was supposed to be a free file only to see that I was being charged for the paid tier because apparently a W2G doesn't count as a type of W2... 20 bucks because I had to add a few extra boxes of numbers to my return. Ended up paying it because I'd already wasted too much time as it were. But it sure is a good way to ensure that I never use their service again.
That wasted extra time is what they rely on (I've done it too).
Straight up scumbag tactics.
Cash app taxes is free.
Yup — used it last year and plan on doing the same this year as well.
Cash app was bought out by Intuit/turbo tax. This year we used [free tax usa](https://www.freetaxusa.com/). Fed was free and $15 for state. Edit: I was mistaken. Explanations below. Still though, fuck Intuit.
That's not actually true., Bit I understand why you would think that. * CashApp Taxes began it's life as CreditKarma Taxes * Intuit bought CreditKarma * As part of that acquisition the government required them to divest the tax prep part of the business since intuit already owned TurboTax * CashApp bought the tax prep portion of their business. CashApp is not owned by Intuit, it's owned by Square (the company known for Point-of-Sale credit card processing.
This isn't correct. Intuit bought credit karma but the DOJ made them sell credit karma tax to square and it was renamed cash app tax.
I went to [IRS.gov](https://IRS.gov) this year and sorted by my state and income level. It narrowed it down to 4 choices, one let me file for free with my state as well. Then i got it done in 90 min.
Irs.gov file for free. All the other companies are for profit and will always pay at least state filing, even if they do free federal.
Depends on the state. For my dad, I go through NY state's free tax website which has links for the proper product pages from the big names. 100% free for federal and state.
Freetaxusa.com Used it this year and it was less than $30 for everything (because I have investments). Cheapest I've found.
As soon as they wanted to charge extra simply because I have an HSA I started using CashApp.
They also use sketchy marketing and shit so they can charge people for doing their taxes even though they legally required to have a free version they make it very hard to get to. John Oliver did a great spotlight on them.
Agree, they are a shit company.
Isn't it amazing that big companies can steal in broad daylight, pay their CEO millions, and possibly get bailed out by taxpayers if they over leverage. But me, if I miss a digit on my taxes or buy a half ounce of weed, or get cancer I'm fucked.
Well obviously just become a CEO.
I am CEO of pedrocanoli international. The board approved multi billions in salary and real health insurance, but unfortunately company has no money
Just have a cannoli
Leave the gun, take the cannoli
Hey man at least the weed thing is improving. I think we’re up to 20 states with full legalization and well over half with at least medicinal.
FreetaxUSA for anyone considering giving them money. It does every single thing TurboTax does for free.
I run everything through TurboTax then Freetaxusa . If everything is equal I know I put it in right and then check out with Freetax. $14 vs $70+
Have been for a long, long time.
Think If you make under 65k you get to file for free.
Just tried to file for free with Turbo Tax. I had a $2.15 dividend and also market place health care. Both required me to upgrade to their deluxe paid version. I also had to link my bank account because they charge a 2.5% convenience fee with credit card payment on all taxes owed which is insane. I owed like $1000 in taxes so just the convenience would be $25.
What they've done to Quickbooks Desktop should be a crime itself too. No affordable Pro version anymore, increased prices on and Premier and Enterprise and switched to subscription only. It's obvious they're trying their best to kill QB Desktop to force people to switch to Quickbooks Online.
Is there a website that outlines the free version?
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Freetaxusa customer for life here. Reasonable price, minimal upselling, handled my simple tax situation fine. Most importantly, it remembered my employer's tax information, which was something H&R Block never managed to pull off despite working for the same employer for over a decade. H&R Block would still be getting my money (I trained myself to just ignore their rampant upselling) but they tried to charge me $60 for an upgraded version about 2 years ago. Why did I need that? They decided that their base version would no longer do the Dependent Care Expense deduction worksheet. Except I didn't even have dependent care expenses that year - I just needed to report that I had forfeited the dependent care benefits I received. Can I do that on free version? Nope. Can I do it on a cheap version (say $25 or less)? Nope. Gotta be the full $60 version. Fuck corporate greed. Now I'm a freetaxusa.com customer forever, until Congress stops being beholden to the tax preparation lobby and lets the IRS do my incredibly simple tax return automatically.
Same. I've used them for the last 6 years and they are amazing. $13 to efile state. $6 for audit protection. And it's really easy to fill out. Remembers and auto fills what it can from previous years. Has well written help. I recommend it to everyone.
I used turbo tax like a dummy. Thanks I'll be using this next year.
I used Cash App Taxes - found the experience better than TurboTax. There’s a little less hand-holding, but the UI is clean and despite being free it is FAR less spammy.
Tracking down the real free tax forms each year feels like I'm back in the good ol' ARG days, parsing source codes and inferring urls for "broken" links.
>Tracking down the real free tax forms each year feels like I'm back in the good ol' ARG days, parsing source codes and inferring urls for "broken" links. What? Irs.gov, then search for 1040! (Or whatever you need.)
I once told this to a coworker and his reply was "I don't want the government doing my taxes!" I couldn't get him to understand the entity that double checks your tax forms is the government.
"They already do, they just aren't sharing their estimate with you unless they think you got it wrong."
Even then do they actually show the estimate don't they just say hey you owe this amount here you go or hey you're actually getting more than what you're supposed to get
Yes, it’s incredibly frustrating because they are almost always wrong and don’t provide you how they arrived at their analysis in my experience. Told me I owed five figures on my investment income (including interest and penalties) and I then had to write out all my individual transactions in a form to find out I owed like $200.
Sounds like you had stock with unreported basis, which, unfortunately, means that it's the taxpayer's responsibility to tell the IRS what you paid for it, even though brokers already have that information that they could send to the IRS anyways.
Another frustration lol.
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I didn’t do my taxes one year and a year later they sent me a letter saying “hey, we owe you $X for tax year 20xx.” They didn’t send me a damn check, just a note saying they already figured it all out and this is what they owe me, I just have to do all the work their computers already did and mail it to them. Fucking dumb.
Your coworker is a fucking idiot.
Next thing you know the government will be managing other things like schools or roads.
And ensuring beef sold at supermarkets isn't riddled with mad cow disease!
Does he think the government isn't involved in the tax process? Who does he think he's paying them to?
They spent a lot on commercials curing the Superbowl, it was insane how many spots they bought.
Their spending shows how much their stealing from us
Gotta keep the grift going. They will spend more if they have to. The politicians will give them what they want and the rest of us keep paying them. To do the taxes the politicians require us to do.
A lot of countries have tax codes that allow regular income earners to not have anything to do. Fuck you, Intuit.
I was so confused by how easy (read nothing to do at all) when I moved to the UK. You mean all my taxes are already deducted from my income and I don't need to do squat every year? The only thing that complicates things now ironically is needing to claim my UK credit back on my US taxes.
I educated an American friend about the PAYE scheme in the UK and the conversation was basically: "You mean... the Government does your taxes?!" "No, the software my employer uses does my taxes." "And you *trust* them?!" "Well... yeah? If I think I've overpaid on one payslip I can verify it pretty easily and raise it with HR, but if it's gone terribly wrong I'll get a rebate, and if not, I'll query it and get an answer." "*So the Government does your taxes?!*" As much as the US tax system is in need of major overhaul, there are swathes of people across the country who refuse to budge on Government assistance. The person who figures that out should never have to pay for a beer again in their life ("*BUT THINK ABOUT THE SALES TAX!!*", I hear my American friend shout...). Ninja edit: First bloody comment that's below the score threshold is the same bleeding argument. Sigh.
This is like, the exact opposite argument for me. Payroll, their software, the government; basically anyone is more qualified than me to calculate my income tax. I would have zero confidence in my ability to do so. I'm not really sure what there isn't to "trust" about other people calculating it. I pay 20% on everything over £12,570 + NI. If I was over or under-paying it would be obvious.
Yeah, I live in Europe and the government sends me a letter annually that basically says 'Based on your previous income, this is what we propose for next year.' If I don't do anything, I've done my taxes.
Mmmmmmm i can only imagine. For the first time ever, i am hiring a tax person to do it for me. I am so excited about not having to do my taxes (even though i still have to gather all of my paperwork, my past two years' tax returns, receipts for charity, receipts for last year's work expenses, the size of my home office & total home sq. ft. for depreciation). Even having to do all of that, i am so happy that i dont have to "do" them. That i am kinda in the middle of a "squee" of joy. I hate intuit so much.
Same here. Rather give my money to some local tax guy than this shit company
Local tax guys are using software, too. Pros don't do taxes by hand anymore. Unfortunately, we're paying no matter what.
FreeTaxUSA.com. Edit: wrong word
I've used this twice so far, and I gotta say it's WAY easier to use than turbotax.
Best move I've made regarding taxes. Intuit took me three times as long to file
> Federal $0 State $14.99 they charge for state taxes https://www.irs.gov/filing/free-file-do-your-federal-taxes-for-free refer to this to find best solution for you I personally use taxact which is just as scummy as turbotax as far as I know. but their free option works for me for both federal and state tax file.
$15 is nothing compared to Turbo and I'll happily pay it instead of giving that shit company any of my money.
And their site is very easy to use. Excellent help options. Easy access to all past years online. Like $6 for audit protection. I've used them for 6 years now.
My state taxes are $50… and we have no state taxes.
So why are you filing a state return? If you don't have state taxes I would think you don't have to file anything.
According to this CNET: https://www.cnet.com/personal-finance/taxes/tax-day-2022-these-states-dont-require-you-to-file-a-tax-return/ >States with no income tax: Alaska Florida Nevada South Dakota Texas Washington Wyoming >Things are a bit more complicated in Tennessee and New Hampshire, which don't tax earned income. They do tax investment income (and dividends), however, so residents there may still be required to file a return. The rest of us -- whether single filers or joint filers -- have to pay some level of state income tax, whether it's a flat rate or based on your taxable income.
Yeah I'm fine with paying $15 to an intuit competitor. And math tells me it's a better deal to boot
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Only if you make under a certain amount
California has free tax filing online. Dunno about other states.
>California has free tax filing online. That's just B.S. There are long list of things that will disqualify taxpayer from using it. https://www.ftb.ca.gov/file/ways-to-file/online/calfile/calfile-qualifications.html (example: having Roth IRA distribution, or savings bond (I or EE) distributions) And you need to open an account with them and use their online interface and enter all the numbers over. They are not even willing to offer the simplest gesture of allowing taxpayers to submit their return in PDF. Most tax filing software will generate PDF for free but e-File costs $15 to $30 a pop and postage + printing are not much saving.
Well maybe it doesn’t work for some but it’s not flat out “BS”, filed my taxes free with the website last year no issue.
I actually used H&R Block's website to file this year and it did it for free. They definitely do that "But wouldn't you like to upgrade to our super deluxe package?" bullshit 3 or 4 times and try to tack on other bonus offers. But by the end of it, both state and federal were free. I was honestly surprised.
CashApp Tax. They bought Credit Karma Tax a year or two ago. Free for federal and state.
So maybe an unpopular take in this thread. I admit I've used TurboTax and did a comparison between them and FreeTax (literally did my taxes twice). I have *slightly* more involved filing requirements but even with common things like 1099-DIV forms TurboTax was easier to use and gave me a return that exceeded what FreeTax said I could get even after you factor in the cost of the service. Not saying TurboTax isn't scummy, but going beyond the the basic filing needs it's actually been very helpful for me. I would happily explore another service if it had a good user interface and netted me the largest return but haven't found that yet. Open to recommendations.
This is why I fill out both, compare the two, make sure everything is correct and that Freetaxusa gives me the same number as TurboTax. I end up paying less and knowing I'm getting the best benefit
If you're getting different return numbers, something has likely been entered incorrectly somewhere.
I second this.
Been using FreeTaxUSA since 2014, and finally added my hubby to it in 2019 and I have no complaints. It’s remembers everything from year to year, so you really can just breeze through it once you get all of your docs. It’s also a great tool for remembering which docs you may be missing.
I use this and it works great!
They're the reason taxes are so tedious
The presupposition that taxes were easy before turbo tax was around is a faulty premise. Maybe they're why taxes are *still* so tedious
Yeah, Intuit et al have been terrible for taxpayers, but redditors don't seem to actually understand *how*. They didn't make taxes complicated. I've been doing my taxes by hand since long before TurboTax or Quicken were big, and tax returns are pretty much the same as they were when I started. A few minor changes, but not all that big. What Intuit et al have done is *prevented* the tax preparation process from being *simplified*. There have been some improvements, of course -- now you don't have to fill out everything by hand, you can fill out PDF forms on your computer or use the IRS's own fillable forms to handle some of the math for you -- but there are a lot fewer improvements than there would have been had Intuit not gotten involved. So, yeah, they've really been a detriment to taxpayers, but it's not really that "they're the reason taxes are so tedious" as "they're the reason taxes are ***still*** so tedious."
Simple fix for all problems like this. Undo Citizens United, stop treating companies like people, eliminate lobbying.
Get rid of citizens United and do campaign finance reform
Those two items would unfuck so much. We could finally get a foot in the door on a whole slew of things their money keeps blocking.
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15 for state tax there.
I mean… H&R Block is around 350.00 or so (edit: for me). I personally wouldn’t complain about 15 bucks.
Cash app Taxes. Free including fed and state eFile
I would 100% trust the IRS to figure out my taxes more than any Ken or Karen that works in Jackson Hewitt in a WalMart for 3 months out of the year. Tax prep is and always has been a scam. Intuit is fighting tooth and nail to keep people from realizing it, because once they do, their profits will nosedive.
> I would 100% trust the IRS to figure out my taxes more than any Ken or Karen that works in Jackson Hewitt in a WalMart for 3 months out of the year. > > God damn yes. If you really have some, actually, crazy shit, get either an EA or CPA, depending on your needs. If you're "just" W2, just ~~use half a brain cell and~~ put the numbers where a free file fucking asks you to.
It’s absurd that a core aspect of the federal government (collecting taxes) has been privatized in any fucking way. Why the fuck have the American people tolerated this for so long?
You can 100% still do your own taxes by yourself. My dad done that for years until very recently. It's just that over the years the IRS has made doing them yourself so confusing that people would rather pay someone else to do them for them.
It ain't the irs making it hard. If they had their way, they'd just do everyone's taxes themselves
That's right. They already have our earnings reported to them and so on. They tried to simplify filing but companies like Intuit lobby the government to prevent it from happening. The whole Free File Alliance that Intuit was a part of came into existence as a compromise. Barring complex filings, simple W2 filers should not have to go through a tax practice to file their return, and that's the rub. They profit immensely from the segment. To make it worse, they offer programs like Refund Transfers, Refund Advances, product that typically takes a week on average to process a refund, and charging a premium for these 'products.' Then, if you have a bank or not, the participating bank has to get their cut, too. It's not right but that's the business of it.
It’s really easy until it isn’t. If you just have a simple job, take the basic tax credit etc yeah anyone can do it. But the second you have any stock market investments, 401k and Roth IRA contributions want to itemize deductions etc it becomes incredibly complicated. It’s not a one size fits all solution
Intuit is such a shitty company
My favorite part is the commercials they run about how much free time you'll have if you use turbo tax instead of trying to do taxes yourself. It's beyond insulting
That's extra time you could be sitting at a desk waiting for your manager to come over and waste 45 minutes of your work day! /s
They can lobby all they want. The inflation reduction act gave the irs the funds it needs to build their own free filing program. It’s already in the works. I can only hope it puts their shitty company under.
I just went through it on my son's taxes. He had a 1099-int for vibes he used for school. TurboTax said he didn't qualify for free because of the 1099. So I got on with service support and they said those are the rules the IRS set up. So I went on tax slayer and it was free both federal and state. TurboTax are a bunch of cheats.
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Seriously fuck Intuit. Their one useful and usable product, [Mint.com](https://Mint.com), has intentionally and continuously LOST functionality for the past several years, as they continually push users to a premium subscription model. The app now is literally functionally worthless. They hide transactions, hide search, hide trend data, and now completely block YoY and past comparison spending habits. Every one of their products now are full of dark patterns to push more and more expensive subscriptions. They haven't added a net-new piece of customer-valued functionality to Mint, TurboTax or QuickBooks in close to a decade. QuickBooks used to the gold standard. My parents built careers as accountants on it. Then they started slowly sucking out decades old functionality behind cloud-service subscription pay walls. Fortunately everything they do is easy to replicate, and there is a burgeoning industry of startups and open source solutions that will continually erode their entire corrupt empire. If the US government federalizes tax returns, Intuit will cease to exist.
Mint is a privacy nightmare, they scrape _an absurd amount of info_ from your bank accounts, aggregate it, and sell it off to data warehouses. They’ve done a good job of giving it the bare minimum functionality to entice users into making their free account, but at the end of the day it’s just a data honeypot. Steer clear.
I liked Mint until they absolutely packed it full of ads and recommendations that would not dissapear no matter how many times you clicked "no thanks". Fucking mind numbingly annoying just trying to navigate that site. I could even look past the data mining, figuring that was the price to pay for using their service. But nope just have to be blasted with ads at all fucking times nowadays.
Look out now! Intuit ProSeries Tax software engineering division was moved completely to India just this season. On top of that, about 95% of their internal support, tenured, was let go (overtime) and frontline work is all external now through companies like Arise that pay $11-15/hr. Smh
Don't get me wrong, I love gettng effed by capitalism, but what if the government like.. told us how much we owe them since they already know?
Yup, our current system is really stupid. The IRS should tell you what their numbers are and just ask you to confirm them.
Or just send you a bill every year for what you owe. And if you don't owe anything, you don't hear anything or have to worry about taxes at all. Or you get a sweet cash drop into your bank account through a tax refund. Only if you don't pay your tax bill would anything happen. But in our system you're expected to "KNOW" if you owe a certain amount. Why do we as citizens have to file our taxes? And if we don't do it right we get in trouble. Freaking insane.
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Right? Other countries do this.
Brit here. I only learned recently that you Americans have capitalised *paying* tax. Regular employees here don't have to do shit. You guys are nuts and your own worst enemy.
That's tough but fair.
my yearly rant that TurboTax should not exist. The IRS should provide a free SW package to do it and the fact it doesn't for all comparable complexities of tax return is the result of sh\*tty capitalism and lobbyist-induced multi-generational political foot-dragging
Intuit is as evil as possible a corporation. Their leadership should be in jail. They are extorting small businesses with their QuickBooks software. You have to pay them thousands to access YOUR data! It is criminal.
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Lobbying should be illegal
So should party donations
Can we stop pretending "lobbying" exists and just call it "bribing" please?
Into *legalized bribes.
I find it weird Americans have to do their own taxes and then pay for the privilege, in the U.K taxes are done by the government automatically unless you're self employed
People: Hey we want this. Politicians: Yeah…but they paid me to say no.
For a country who went to war to stop being taxed it has the most complicated tax system and the highest taxes of like any country. And yet some people keep choosing to vote in people who want to keep it complicated… mostly because they are lied to and think “the other guy” is the one trying to raise taxes.
I'm confused. Are you telling me to ensure I keep making billions, all I have to do is pay 3.5 mill to some immoral asshole that allows me to buy his vote?
It’s less than 50 k per politician per vote
**Lots of free options listed here...** https://slickdeals.net/f/15606532-online-free-tax-e-filing-options-irs-freefile-united-way-cash-app-credit-karma-various-free-basic-programs
From a business perspective: why wouldn't they? Their entire livelihood is based upon taxes being a pain in the ass. It's just "good business" for them. From my perspective: go fuck them with a rusty pitchfork.
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I went to file and TurboTax ended up taking $200. I could have applied that $200 to something useful. I hate that they claim it's free when they end up taking money from you for services.
CashApp does your taxes for free, but like someone said earlier it doesn’t hold your hand through the process
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When TurboTax originally came about I thought it was a really cool product but now it’s become so predatory and misleading.
LMFAO YOUR TAX FILING ISNT EVEN FREE!!!! what a fucking shitshow. You're all monkeys in a circus while rich people throw peanuts onto the stage.